1162 A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



any magnitude is pending consideration, the officials of the county 

 concerned are afforded opportunity to informally indicate whether 

 such exchange would be adverse to the welfare of the county, and if they 

 make such a showing, the exchange is either modified or abandoned. 



EFFECT ON EXISTING OR CONTEMPLATED STATE OR COUNTY 



FOREST PROGRAM 



The Federal forest land acquisition program lacks any element of 

 competition with similar programs of other political jurisdictions. 

 Where State or county initiative reasonably is meeting the requirement 

 of forest conservation or has definite future plans to do so, action by 

 the Federal Government is, of course, unnecessary. In the formula- 

 tion of the Federal program the effect on existing or contemplated 

 State or county forest programs is therefore a major consideration; 

 and where there is reason to believe that the inauguration of a 

 Federal program of purchase would militate against an actual or 

 contemplated State or county program, the Federal plan is appro- 

 priately modified. Usually there is no conflict except where the same 

 lands are involved in both or several programs. Mere adjacency or 

 or contiguity of State and Federal forest holdings is not an adverse but 

 rather a favorable feature since it permits of better coordination and 

 the various economies obtainable through cooperation. Many 

 national forests adjoin and in some instances surround State forest 

 units without appreciable detriment to the management of either 

 property. 



EFFECT ON ACTUAL OR PROBABLE PRIVATE MANAGEMENT OF 

 FOREST PROPERTIES 



Every public forest policy thus far evolved places the major 

 dependence upon private initiative for future timber supplies and 

 satisfactory management of forest lands. A program of forest-land 

 acquisition which would minimize or .defeat the fullest practical 

 measure of private forest management therefore would be against 

 the public interest, and any feature of the Federal acquisition pro- 

 gram which would have that effect is either modified or abandoned. 



METHODS BY WHICH FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CAN 

 ACQUIRE FOREST LANDS 



LAND EXCHANGES 



The first legislative provision for the public acquisition of privately 

 owned lands within national forests was the ill-famed forest-lieu 

 selection provision of the act of June 4, 1897 (30 Stat. 11, 56), which 

 had two major purposes: (1) to enable the private landowner to escape 

 the assumed restrictions of a federally managed reservation, and (2) 

 to promote the more efficient and economical administration of such 

 reservations. The idea was good; the provisions for its enforcement 

 wholly bad. The Secretary of the Interior was given no adminis- 

 trative discretion, no authority to withhold approval of selections 

 involving disproportionate values. The law permitted owners of 

 lands within national forests to do certain things and naturally the 

 owners took advantage of it. The Secretary of the Interior could not 

 deny landowners the right to do what the law allowed ; even where he 

 knew that the lands reconveyed to the United States were practically 



